The present invention relates to an assembly for readying yarn packages for unwinding at a textile winding machine.
The improved capability of newer commercially available textile spinning machines to produce a relatively high output of yarn packages has placed a corresponding demand on textile winding machines of the type operatively connected with such relatively high output spinning machines to efficiently and relatively rapidly perform winding operations on the yarn packages delivered thereto from the spinning machines. Increases in the productivity of such winding machines must be created not only through improvements of the winding stations which unwind the yarn from the yarn packages but also through improvements in the other components of the winding machine, such as components which ready the yarn packages for winding at the winding stations, components which deliver yarn packages from a yarn package receiving location to the winding stations and components which deliver empty tubes from the winding stations to a removal location. A closed transport loop configuration on the winding machine and devices for directly transferring yarn packages from a spinning machine to a winding machine are two examples of improvements in the production capability of spinning and winding machines.
At some location between the spinning station at which a yarn package is built and the winding station at which yarn from the yarn package is unwound, the yarn package must undergo a yarn end readying process in which the yarn end is disposed in a preferred preliminary disposition for ready engagement at the winding station. While it is widely known to provide a device for finding and preparing a yarn end of a yarn package at a suitable location on the winding machine, experience has shown that it is virtually impossible for one such device to successfully find and ready the yarn end of every yarn package which is handled thereby. Thus, a certain percentage of yarn packages delivered to the winding machine must be further handled to insure that the yarn end of every package arriving at a winding station for unwinding thereat is disposed in a preferred preliminary disposition for engagement at the winding station.
In German Patentschrift 30 45 825, a yarn end readying process is proposed in which those yarn packages whose yarn ends have not been successfully preliminarily disposed by an initial yarn end readying process are recirculated to the yarn end readying devices for additional yarn end readying cycles. However, the recirculation of such yarn packages in this manner exposes these yarn packages to relatively high cumulative stresses due to the repeated handling of the yarn packages by the yarn end readying devices. Moreover, the mixing of such recirculating yarn packages with those yarn packages which have not yet been initially handled for yarn end preparation increases the average time of handling of those yarn packages whose yarn ends are initially successfully readied.
German Patentschrift 32 35 442 discloses an assembly in which a plurality of individual package support members travel in a closed loop between the spinning machine and the winding machine. A rotating platform member having a plurality of yarn package readying devices mounted about its circumference is provided for readying the yarn ends of yarn packages delivered to the winding machine. Those packages whose yarn ends are not initially successfully disposed in a preferred preliminary disposition following their initial circuit around the yarn end readying devices are re-circulated to the yarn end readying devices for another attempt to dispose their yarn ends in preferred preliminary dispositions. However, the mixing of those yarn packages being recirculated with fresh incoming yarn packages detrimentally increases the average handling time of those yarn packages whose yarn ends are successfully disposed in a preferred preliminary disposition following their initial circuit to the yarn end readying devices.
Accordingly, the need exists for an assembly for handling yarn packages delivered from a spinning machine to a winding machine to insure that the yarn ends of the yarn packages are efficiently disposed in preferred preliminary dispositions.